So..... If this makes me OCD then so be it... I started using XFCE yesterday on Linux Mint... and it was good... but it wasn't. There were little things that annoyed me about it... I ended up swapping out the screensaver/lock screen for the default Gnome gnome-screensaver, and that was fine... but then... I use a passphrase on my ssh key, a really long passphrase... so typing it in... all the time isn't something I want to do... and I copy it every where...
Gnome would ask me for that passphrase on first logging into a system that requested it after a reboot... I liked that, and I wanted to do that. Kept seeing a bunch of people saying "try this", "add this here"... none of which worked... Come to find that it relates to the gnome-keyring running or not... not sure... cause some were saying it needed to be running others were saying to turn it off... tho, I couldn't tell if that was because they were starting it in some hacked init scripts they were doing or what... either way... thats retarded... My Ubuntu desktops haven't needed any of that crap for years... something like that should *just work*. Which made me think... Xubuntu. So... figured... what the hell... I reinstalled my laptop this morning with the latest beta Xubuntu... since it will be the next release next month... and a long term support release... the beta should be fairly stable right? :) Anyway... Everything is working awesome now! glad I gave Xubuntu a try.
Unity/Gnome 3 still suck :P
I've been running Linux Mint 12 (with Gnome 3 and Mint's shell extensions) for a week now. And... while the extensions, as well as just Gnome 3 shell are more usable than Ubuntu's Unity interface... it still taking me way to long to do much of anything.... And I'm not sure if I should load Mate (gnome2 rebuild) or if I should just go to another desktop environment. At the moment, I'm leaning towards another desktop environment.... simply because who knows really how long Mate will be around... I loved the old Gnome2 interface... but Gnome3 leaves much to be desired. I can't find what I have open half the time... Its just not "more usable" like they claim it should be. I'm open to new interfaces... really I am... it just needs to make things easier tho... not harder.
Honest critique, I use more than one application to do things. For any given task... a term window (or many depending), a web browser... and an other app or two on top of that may be used... and, as I've stated before... I separate tasks based on multiple virtual desktops... gnome3 seems to think I only ever want to have one terminal window open at a time... or one web browser... I don't... I want multiple... one or two on each virtual desktop, with multiple tabs in each. thats what I want, thats how I work... I don't care if you think thats messy, it works for me. And, if you new interface doesn't allow me to work that way... I'm going to something else that will. XFCE4 here I come.
Well... They did it... not sure what their real goal is... but Unity is unusable in my mind. Its not that it doesn't "work"... its that it won't work for what I do. I can't find the 5+ different windows of the same app I'll have open on multiple desktops. I upgrade to 11.10... and after a week of using it... found that I'm more frustrated that ever with it. This is the same reason... I can't work with MacOSX. Windows 7 with my limited uses of it... does seem to actually have a method which might possibly work with this new design for desktops... but I have no way of knowing for sure... since I've yet to see multiple desktops on them. Gnome Shell might not have the same flaws as Unity in this respect... however with Ubuntu going full steam into their Unity desktop. I split the jobs I have at hand between 5 desktops on my current laptop. Work Email + Random simple tasks on desktop 1, development tasks on desktops 2 and 3 (separate projects), Music/entertainment stuff on Desktop 4... and whatever else comes along for desktop 5. This is what works for me... and forcing me to change... means I'll find something else that won't. So... I reinstalled my desktop yesterday to ubuntu 11.04... I will stay there until I find a suitable replacement... which will probably be Straight up Debian again. (I ran Debian Unstable on my desktop back in high school) But... I hate to say it Ubuntu/Cannonical... you probably will loose any and all recommendations from me. My laptop is not a Tablet, nor a Phone, I still have a laptop because I need to really work on it. My phone is NOT a replacement for it, and won't be for the foreseeable future... eventually probably... but not yet. That is all.
